Or, somebody chowing down on some Resiniferatoxin.

E does what I tell it to do and gets the heck out of the way otherwise. That's something that Gnome and, to a lesser extent, KDE seem to have a real problem with. As far as XFCE, LXDE et al, dunno. I've used Enlightenment off and on for rather a long time, and haven't found it necessary to spend much time with the other lightweight desktop options.

In this argument, the phone system is analogous to the Internet, as a whole. When you're connected to the phone system, you can contact anyone else who's on the phone system, regardless of their local provider. Granted, you may have to may some sort of toll, if they don't use the same provider, or are geographically distant (depending on your provider). However, they're still accessible.

Hmm. I have a Kickstarter account, but I haven't gotten a notification email, so far.

Linux + Sanyo 4900 + Sprint = Slow, but take it most anywhere, Internet.

All it needs is a relatively simple ppp setup and you're good to go. Besides the speed and the cell phone's tendency to refuse to transmit for several minutes at a time on random intervals, it's pretty decent. Oh, and Sprint get's cranky if you ask them if it's ok to do this. So don't. No guarantee they won't suddenly decide to charge you extra, but hey, that's life.